Well, another Christmas season is upon us, and it’s Caramel 2, Hello Again 0.
Last year’s batch was undercooked; too runny to serve alone. I tried freezing it and coating it in chocolate, but it oozed out of tiny crevices in the chocolate; a total wash.
This year I overcooked it and it is just plain too hard. You simply can’t bite into it.
I’ve used recipes from both The Joy of Cooking and The Settlement Cookbook, but I don’t believe the recipe is the problem – I’m pretty sure I lack technique. I’m using a candy themometer already … and anyway in the time it takes to test the mix in water it goes from 242 (undercooked) to 244 (perfect) to 246 (overcooked).
Is there any special trick to this or should I stick to my never-fail toffee recipe and chocolate truffles?
PS - what can I do with 1/2 lb of too-hard caramel, which is not quite hard enough to be toffee?
My guess is that you have too hot a burner. You might try turning it down low when the temperature is getting close.
Also – are you sure your thermometer is calibrated properly? I had one that had a metal sleeve that would let the glass tube slide up and down enough to be off by as much as 20 degrees. See what it reads when dunked in boiling water.
As for your too-hard caramel: smash it up/chop coarsely, put it in a small pan with a couple ounces of cream and heat in a double boiler. You may have to add more cream, but you’ll end up with yummy caramel sauce for ice cream.
Melt in the microwave on partial power. Add milk to caramel. It’s hit or miss on how much to runny and it’s ice cream topping. To hard and you break a tooth.
I do believe that your temperatures you are heating too are incorrect and way too low. According to Sherry Yard in her book The Secrets of Baking:
*" To carmelize sugar, you combine sugar, water and corn syrup in a saucepan, cover it, and set it over high heat. As the mixture heats it releases steam, which the lid traps. Condensation forms and runs down the inside of the pot, washingh away any stray sugar crystals. After 4 minutes you can remove the lid. The sugar will be boiling and noticably thicker. Set a thermometer in the pot to monitor the temperature which at this point should read between 230 and 240 degrees F.
As the water heats up, it evaporates. The sugar begins to thicken and the bubbles get bigger. As the temperature increases, the color deepens and the flavor intensifies… These changes occur more quickly as the temperature rises. At 310-degrees F, the sugar begins to turn a pale golden color and the caramel should be watched closely. At 310 to 325 the color is golden brown. Above 375 the, the caramel becomes quite bitter and as the process is irreversible, it is too late. In a heavy pot on high heat the entire process should take about 10 minutes… I advise you to take it off the burner at 325-degrees if you like golden brown or at 350-degrees for dark caramel." *
The tempertures I am going by are the same in all of my cookbooks for “soft-ball” stage candy. I am talking about chewy caramels, the ones you buy in squares, not crispy brittle caramel. The instructions above would make a syrup which would crisp on cooling, for decorations or spun sugar or whatnot. That is the “hard crack” stage of candymaking. The window for soft-ball stage (it forms a ball which can be squished when dropped in water) is very narrow. Hard-crack is infititely more forgiving.
Thanks everyone. I took part of the batch and smashed it into flakes, I’m going to make “caramel-apple cookies.” The rest I will try to rescesitate using the microwave method.
My altitude is just a bit above sea level (around 300ft). Its never affected any other form of cookery.
BTW, thanks for the primer info. Unfortunately it didn’t contain any info that was new to me. I have no trouble with anything in the hard-crack spectrum. Only chewy candy eludes me. Caramel is becoming my nemesis.
I made a more forgiving recipe yesterday – a coconut candy which is something like the inside of a Mounds bar – intenetionally partially crystallized – covered in dark chocolate. NUMS!
LOL, I’ve done that, except I left the can intact (which the label says NEVER EVER to do, but millions of Brazillians, can’t be wrong, right?) It takes about 4-6 hours of boiling, plus consistent topping up of the water (if the can isn’t fully covered you have problems) and the result is a viscous, delicious paste, more like Dulce de leche. Tasty, but not the thing I had in mind. It’s a pain, anyway (caramel’s a pain too, obvously, but it doesn’t take all afternoon)
You are correct regarding the temperature for “soft ball” but I would once again remind you of StarvingButStrong’s suggestion of calibrating your thermometer.
If the problem is sugar cystallization then the same reference (Sherry Yard’s Secrets of Baking) suggests that you make sure to use new sugar, keep everything spotlessly clean, and don’t add anything that could act as a seed for crystallization to start. Use a metal spoon and, if necessary, the addition of a small amount of acidity (for example, in the form of lemon juice) can also prevent crystallization.
You simply can’t bite into it.